The name Michael C. Ford will probably ring a bell to not just a few Manteca Unified School District students who were in elementary and high school during the mid-to-late 1980s. Those were the years when the award-winning spoken-word artist did stints as a poet-in-residence at Brock Elliott School, Manteca High and other campuses in the district.
Chances are, some of the students he taught probably still have in their possession today copies of an anthology of the youthful verses they penned in the classroom which was “published” at the end of their poetry lessons with the Grammy/Pulitzer Prize poet.
Ford was actually the resident poet for San Joaquin County area schools as well as language arts consultant for the California Poets-in-the-Schools program at the time, so he touched the lives of hundreds more would-be young poets than just those he mentored in the Manteca Unified School District. (more…)
Last Month Hen House Curated a Night of Poetry and Music at Beyond Baroque…Watch Ellyn’s Performance and Subscribe to Hen House’s Youtube Channel here!
********************************** ROUND 9: SAN FRANCISCO
Thursday, OCT. 14TH – 7 P.M.
SPARRING W/ BEATNIK GHOSTS
RETURNS TO THE BEAT MUSEUM
540 Broadway – North Beach
Guest Host…Ginger Murray
David Meltzer
Ellyn Maybe & Her Band
Steve Arntson
Jerry Ferraz
Martin Hickle
Richard Loranger
Whitman McGowan
Julie Rogers
Margery Snyder
Chris Vannoy
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ROUND 10: BERKELEY
Friday, OCT. 15th – 7 p.m.
SPARRING WITH BEATNIK GHOSTS
@ ART HOUSE GALLERY
& CULTURAL CENTER
2905 Shattuck – at Ashby
Guest Host…Mark States
Ellyn Maybe & Her Band
J.R. Brady
Tim Donnely
Q. R. Hand
Mike The Poet
H.D. Moe
A. M. Stanley
Plus: Mystery Poets (To Be Announced)
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ROUND 11: SANTA CRUZ
Saturday, OCT. 16th – 7 p.m.
SPARRING WITH BEATNIK GHOSTS
REVISITS FELIX KULPA GALLERY
107 Elm Street – Downtown Santa Cruz
Guest Host…Marc Kockinos
Gary Young, Santa Cruz Poet Laureate
Ellyn Maybe & Her Band
Dennis Holt
Debbie Kirk
Ron Lampi
Erik Lawson
B.C. Petrakos
William Taylor, Jr.
Mel C. Thompson
Plus Mystery Guest
I have started to write something about you for your site several times, and each time I am struck by my inability to describe what you do in terms beautiful enough, original enough to do you justice. But it’s always been this way. Who has ever been able to say in other words what a song says? Maybe it’s why I like your poems so much, they say what can only be said in exactly the way you say it. The best way of turning someone on to you is to play you for them. – Jackson Browne
